1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a layout editing apparatus used to edit a layout of images and characters disposed on a page of a document and store a generated page design into a file.
2. Description of the Related Art
As discussed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 05-250453, a conventional layout editing apparatus can display a group of stock materials including images required for editing a document, such as reduced images belonging to the same category, in an area or a window different from an editing area. The layout editing apparatus enables a user to select one or plural materials and additionally displays each selected material in the editing area.
A conventional layout editing method includes collecting some stock materials as candidates to be used in a document editing operation, temporarily storing (displaying) the collected materials in another area or a window to enable a user to designate one or plural materials, and adding the designated material(s) into an editing area of a document.
Another conventional layout editing apparatus can display a toolbox of document editing functions in a separate window and enable a user to move the document editing toolbox window to an arbitrary place on a screen when a user performs an editing operation.
Furthermore, another conventional layout editing apparatus memorizes the position of a toolbox window when a user closes application software and, when the application is subsequently opened, automatically displays the toolbox window at a previous position.
However, according to the above-described conventional layout editing apparatuses, the material group information and the toolbox window information are displayed in independent areas different from an editing area of a document and may be simultaneously lost immediately after the application software is closed.
Although these information data may be memorized in relation to the application, the required material group and the window position are basically dependent on each document. If an editing apparatus is configured to uniformly memorize the material group and the window position depending on the used application, a user is required to re-select a material group and move the window position for each document.